Blood and Bone(34)

Regards,

Dr. Jenner Piscapault

There is a date stamp on it, but it doesn't make sense. It's only one  year old. It would suggest I was here a year ago, which is impossible,  considering I haven't been out of Seattle in a year, apart from now.  Someone else has a key? Is that possible? It doesn't seem likely,  considering the security here and level of friendship I clearly have  with the man outside the door. I shake it off, pushing past the  information. I need more answers than this. This has only raised  questions.

Next I find an evaluation by the very same Dr. Jenner Piscapault. His  write-up is technical, but from what I can comprehend, he is the  psychiatrist in charge of determining a test subject's mental health.  The assessment is tricky to understand; words like diminished empathy,  abnormal personality dimensions, disinhibition, and high psychoticism  stand out as the most used. I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed, but I  understand the gist of it. The subject is a psycho, it's fairly  obvious. They don't use the word, maybe afraid of labeling him or her.  Or maybe all the words they keep repeating just mean psycho. I don't  know, but I can tell they aren't the sort of words a person wants to  have written about oneself.

Well, apart from one bit in the evaluation. The doctor found that test  subject seven had remarkably low levels of narcissism for someone with  such a lack of remorse or guilt.

She has a strong connection to animals. She refuses to kill them when  she's awake. The trauma from her childhood has stuck with her, and  created psychosis. She sleepwalks, killing whatever comes into her path,  even animals. When she wakes to find what she has done, the remorse  returns. She cannot shake it when she discovers she has wronged an  animal. She has become less attached to humans, though. She is the last  test subject to assimilate to the cutting off of the emotional mind from  the physical body. Permission has been granted to remove her from this  test facility. She is to join him in a RL scenario testing. Dr. Angela  O'Conner, from the United Kingdom, will be joining him. She specializes  in this type of deep-cover, scenario-based training. It will be a  controlled environment to further reach inside her.

My brain feels like it's about to explode, but the cracking sound inside  my head is from my heart. Even if, apparently, I don't actually have  one.





16. I WILL FREE YOU

The silence of the frosted-glass room is too much to endure when taking  in knowledge such as this. I'm only about thirty percent sure I haven't  actually fallen asleep and dreamt the things I am reading. I turn back,  looking at the man with his back to the door, and wonder what he is to  me, the real me. The man-made girl who believed a thousand lies and  trusted her heart to a master puppeteer.         

     



 

I am Pinocchio, only my blue fairy turned out to be a scheming bastard  who wanted to make me an assassin. I blink again, staring at the words  expected date for reinsertion, but I am drawing a blank as to what it  means. The date is set for three months from today.

Three months?

I don't even think I can guess what it means, but I know it's bad. It's  all bad. At the bottom of the box is a box of matches. I lift the folder  with the random words, detailing things I won't ever understand, and  feel the weight of it in my hands. It's heavy like a gun and a key and a  secret are. It's heavy like it contains every secret in the world,  every whisper of treachery.

But it doesn't. It contains only mine. Whispers of love and promises that he would take care of me.

I glance down into the bottom of the black metal bin, stunned when I see  the words "I will free you." They're silver letters, scratched into the  metal box.

One sentence.

I'm pretty sure I have an ulcer, and I'm positive this one sentence has  flared it to a bad place. A place I might never heal from.

I turn, hurrying to the door, and bang on it.

He points at the box, shaking his head, and makes a weird motion with  his hands. Clearly, he means I have to place the box back before the  doors will open.

Of course . . .

I hurry back, stuffing the folder in the box and grabbing the box of  matches. I don't know if I am making a terrible decision or if I am  following the instincts that are inside me. I light the match and drop  it into the papers. They light quickly, so I cover the box slightly,  only letting a bit of air into it. Smoke starts to billow, making me  promptly regret doing it. I glance back, seeing the man, and wonder if  he can tell I'm burning something. The smoke fills the room, making the  frosted glass appear far more frosted than before.

I have to back away as the folder burns up; the smoke is too thick. I  blink away the stinging in my eyes and hurry back to the box, pushing  the lid down all the way and sliding it to the spot. The door opens on  the back wall, pulling the box back into the wall.

I turn and look at the door as it opens. He points at the spot where my  key slides from. I shake my head. "I don't need it anymore."

He winces in the smoke. "I gathered." He nods at the large black box next to me. "It's a burn box."

I shrug and follow him from the room. "How do I know you?"

He glances back at me, sighing. "Again?" I nod, making him wince. He  holds a hand out to the right, not the hallway we came down. "Come this  way." He offers me his arm. "You and I met five years ago when he was  starting something he referred to as the escape hatch. He placed what he  called an emergency file into the safety-deposit box and got two keys  cut. One for you and one for him."

"Who are you? Are you a doctor involved in all this?"

He chuckles. "No, Sam. I'm a banker. I just know him because of some business a few years ago."

"Who am I?"

He shakes his head. "Someone who means a lot to that man."

"Do you have answers for me?"

He shakes his head. "But I have a bag, a satchel that he left here last  year. It will get you to where you need to go to end all of this and  find your way back." He leads me to the back door and enters a small  office. He opens a filing cabinet and hands me a man's satchel. He steps  toward me, hugging me. I don't know what to do about it all or what to  do with it, but I don't fight him on the embrace. He pats my back and  nods. "Run, Sam. Run as fast as you can."

"I feel like a contestant on a game show. I feel like everything is a  maze and I'm running through it, trying to survive, but I don't get  answers, only more questions. I'm running in circles, lost in the maze."

He pulls back, running a hand down my cheek. "I can't imagine how that  must be. I am so sorry, but these are the only answers I have for you."

"Well, thanks for the satchel." I have to assume there's a bomb in it,  or worse. That's just the way my life has been going lately . . .

When I climb the stairs he presses a switch, and I hear the doors  unlocking so I can walk out into the alley next to the large stone bank.

I lean my back against the door and sigh. The trip has been a waste in  so many ways and a disaster in others. I don't have any clear answers. I  don't know what aspects of my life are true or false. I don't know  anything. Clinging to the satchel, I walk the alley to a small coffee  shop. I go inside, walking straight to the bathroom, and close the door.  Kneeling down, I lift the lid from the bag, and I'm confused by its  contents. There are stacks of euros and several passports, each  containing a birth certificate to a different country and a driver's  license. There are three cell phones, all turned off completely. A set  of keys on a key chain with a boat on it. The boat's name is Thackeray  Binx. I don't know how I know that but I do. My insides twist, reminding  me I need to go get my damned cat back. The final thing is a notebook. I  open it, finding handwritten notes about progress reports and dream  analyses. They're in my writing.         

     



 

I close the bag, wondering how the hell I will ever get away from all of  this. I turn on the three phones, but only the white one comes up as  having messages. I turn off the other two and press the voice mail  button. I enter the code that I always use, and of course it works.

"Hi, Jane, it's Derek. Meet me in Paris at the place you remember. All  will be revealed then, if it's safe." I scowl at the phone, not  recalling a single place until he says the words "I will set you free."  Then an image bursts into my head of an explosion, freeing up space and  burning away old images as if I am watching a picture burn slowly. The  haze of memories, lies that tell me I remember who I am, starts to clear  away. The images are confusing, of course, but also enlightening.  Suddenly, I'm alone on a pier, watching a sunset. A man is next to me.  He watches the sunset too, not looking at me. For some reason I can't  clearly see his face.

"I killed the doctor," he says like he is telling me it's Thursday or he  likes sandwiches. I nod, not caring that another man is dead. He turns.  His face is still hazy, but I know his voice. "Dash is dead, and I'm  going to set us free."